National Library of Ireland – Sources & Mergers

The National Library of Ireland has launched a new database, SOURCES, which they say ‘will revolutionise the finding of source material for Irish research… contains over 180,000 catalogue records for Irish manuscripts, and for articles in Irish periodicals.’ Revolutionise is a strong word to use however it is interesting to see the use of XML (Extensible Markup Language), Metadata Object Description Schema (MODS) and open source software in this project

The job specification for Director of the National Library of Ireland has been brought to my attention. It mentions that one of the duties of the new Director will be ‘Planning, managing and organising the merger of the Irish Manuscripts Commission and the National Archives of Ireland into the National Library’. In the 2009 Budget delivered by the Minister for Finance on 15 October 2008, it was announced that the Irish Manuscripts Commission and the National Archives of Ireland would be merged into the National Library of Ireland. What effect will this merger have on the archivists, record mangers, conservators and librarians of Ireland? What effect will this merger have on keeping records in Ireland?